Monthly Archives: October 2005

Officials in the Southern California city that is home to Disneyland voted on Tuesday night to impose strict new rules on the operation of hookah cafes which they say cater to a rowdy clientele.

The ordinance barring alcohol, disc jockeys and live entertainment such as belly dancing, and calling for equipment to filter smoke is expected to win final approval on November 8 and would apply to Anaheim’s 11 smoking lounges.

since i’m posting on halloween, i’ll go ahead and posit that this is a huge opening for dead entertainment and a great opportunity for the goth/zombie bellydance contingent…

MORUYA Pre-school has found an innovative way to raise funds to enclose the back verandah of the Campbell Street building and create a new and very functional additional space for the school.

When the pre-school’s fund-raising committee decided to take on the challenge and raise $7000 for the project, Amber Paisley Top volunteered her skills as a belly dancer to run classes for the rest of the year.

Forty-four women and girls, aged between 12 and 70 years, signed up to take a 10-week course during term three, choosing either a beginners’ or intermediate level class. That way $3000 was raised.

Dr. [Anthony] Shay [dance historian at Pomona College in California] says the West’s “pink and blue syndrome” when it comes to dance moves isn’t shared by other regions of the world, pointing to the similarities in female and male movements in salsa and Polynesian dancing.

“The idea that these movements are only appropriate to women’s bodies is wrong,” he says. “We think when a male articulates his torso he is somehow being effeminate, but that is really a culturally specific notion held by Anglo-Americans.”